“I don’t see electricity lines here: where are they?” President Yoweri Museveni, the NRM presidential flag-bearer asked at his first rally in Kabale district, which was held at Ifasha grounds in Rubanda West constituency.
“Those who have organised the rally here have done a good job. Unlike in other parts where I have been to, I can see that you do not have power,” he said, attracting loud cheers from the mammoth crowd.
Museveni promised that electricity would be extended to the area by connecting it to the power line that stretches to neighboring Kisoro district where even the remotest villages are on the grid.
“We will connect to that line so that you too can have electricity,” he said, eliciting applause from supporters, who had painted the grounds yellow with T-shirts, flags and posters of their candidate.
The President’s promise of expanding electricity to Rubanda heralded good fortune to Kenneth, a trader at Muko market, Kiruruma village and part-time tour guide.
“We have a lot of tourist attractions, including Bwindi Impenetrable National Park and forest reserves. We need electricity, good hotels and roads to encourage tourists to come here,” he told New Vision.
Opinion poll
In Kabale district, planning and development, health and roads are the top three issues that voters want candidates in next year’s polls to address, according to a recent Vision Group opinion poll.
Across the western region, roads and health are the top issues voters want candidates to address, the poll shows. Kabale is the second district in the region where President Museveni is campaigning, after he concluded his campaign tour of Kisoro district on Thursday.
Joab Tukamuheebwa, a 29-year-old farmer in Kabale district, who grows Irish potatoes and earns sh2m from his one-acre farm in Bushuura parish, said he wants the Government to establish a farmers’ bank.
“We want a bank that is sensitive to our challenges. One that will not harass us when the season does not post a good harvest,” Tukamuhebwa said.
Patrick Bitende, a 58-year-old farmer from Kibugize parish in Rubanda East constituency, says he will vote for Museveni for maintaining peace and stability, but said he wants his candidate to work on roads.
“Museveni has done a good job. I want him to stay. All I want him to do is work on the road from Bushuura to Kibugize,” he said.
Museveni was accompanied to the rallies by his daughter, Natasha Karugire. A mammoth crowd of supporters chanted “No Change” as he drove through the rally venue.
He was introduced to voters by the Prime Minister, Dr. Ruhakana Rugunda, who implored supporters to vote for Museveni in honour of his efforts to restore peace, unity and development in Uganda.
“I have known and worked with President Museveni for almost 50 years now. He loves Uganda and even as a young man, he led the struggle against the tyranny of (former president) Idi Amin and bad governance under Milton Obote,” Rugunda told the supporters. “He has gone ahead to ensure that even neighbouring countries get peace, including mediating talks to end the crisis in Burundi. Come February 18, give all your votes to him,” he said.
Steel factory
Museveni pledged to establish a steel factory in the district to process the vast deposits of iron ore and other minerals discovered through geological surveys.
“You have a lot of iron ore. We want to build a big steel factory here,” Museveni revealed to the excited crowd. He, however, said setting up such a factory is complex because it requires coal.
“We cannot use charcoal in the factory, but the good thing is that we have discovered gas deposits. Our plan is to pump gas from Lake Albert to this place so that we can produce steel,” Museveni explained.
The area holds 50 million tonnes of iron ore deposits, which can be processed for 50 years, at a rate of one million tonnes per year with each tonne fetching $150m (about sh502b) and creating jobs for many people, he said.
The President said the new factory would reduce the reliance on recycled scrap metal to produce steel bars and dismissed reports that the location of the proposed steel factory had been shifted to Mbarara.
“Some Ugandans are liars. What will the factory do in Mbarara? There is no steel or gas. The minerals are here and Kisoro has wolfram, which we will process,” he said
Rubanda district
“We agreed in Parliament on your demand for a district. You will have your own district of Rubanda,” Museveni told the crowd that filled the grounds and perched up on a hill.
Rubanda West MP and state minister for economic monitoring Henry Banyenzaki and Ndorwa West MP and state minister for finance planning David Bahati, attended the rally.
Banyenzaki, who lost to Eng Dennis Sabiiti for the NRM position, was booed by the crowd as he walked to the venue of the rally in Bufundi sub-county.
Later, when given a chance by Museveni to speak to the crowd, Banyenzaki was booed again, prompting the President to wave to the supporters entreating them to calm down.
Sabiiti, who spoke next, received a thunderous applause in the form of cheers and clapping as he took to the dais and implored the supporters to vote for Museveni and all the district NRM flag-bearers.
Among the NRM flag-bearers are Patrick Keihwa, the incumbent LC5 chairperson, who went through unopposed and NRM Woman MP flag-bearer Catherine Ndamira.
Wealth creation
Museveni said NRM has achieved ‘steady progress’, a catch-phrase for the party’s campaign manifesto, by fostering unity and shunning politics that promotes sectarianism.
“We shunned such politics in the 1960s. DP and UPC were split along religious lines. Electricity has no religion. It does not wear a rosary; nor can it be circumcised,” he said.
“We shunned the exclusion of women, youth and persons with disabilities. A woman is as able as anyone. Religion prepares us for heaven, but politics is about managing how we live on earth.”
He identified the four pillars of Uganda’s progress as unity, peace, strength and transformation, and said the remaining task for the NRM was wealth creation.
He cited the increase in the budget for NAADS, which he said was mismanaged by technocrats, but had since been resuscitated by enlisting the army to supply inputs to farmers.
“They (NAADs officials) spent the money in increasing their salaries and seminars. We have now recruited soldiers and the little we gave them; they have used it well,” he said.
Museveni said the budget for NAADs would be expanded to sh1,000b, up from sh200b in order to meet the overwhelming need for seeds, cattle and other agricultural inputs.
He also promised that each district will get at least sh2b under the youth fund, sh234b for women and sh180b for SACCOs, with the latter ensuring every village has at least a sh2m savings credit fund.
Three cross to NRMThree leading opposition figures in the region announced during the rally in Ifasha that they had crossed to the NRM party.
“I have seen the light and joined the NRM,” Henry Tumushabe, the former Kisoro district co-coordinator of the Go-Forward group, told the cheering crowd.
He crossed along with William Harerimana, the former Kisoro district speaker, who had joined the Go-Forward team and Archangel Nshyimimana, the district co-ordinator of the FDC.
Museveni was handed a spear, shield and stool by the people of Rubanda, symbolising their endorsement of his authority.
